Traditionally, cameras record the image captured at the moment of operation of the shutter key (or thereafter).
However, it is not possible to record an image captured prior to the operation of the shutter key.
Hence, a solution to this issue has been devised.
For example, Unexamined Japanese Patent Application KOKAI Publication No. 2006-174188 discloses the following technique:
Prior to detection of the operation of the shutter key, cyclically storing pieces of captured image data in a buffer region and displaying them on a display device. If operation of the shutter key is detected whilst an image is being displayed, that image being displayed at the time of detection is then stored as a file on the recording medium.
However, because it is described in Unexamined Japanese Patent Application KOKAI Publication No. 2006-174188 that the currently-captured image is also displayed on the display device in the same way as conventional methods, operators are unable to determine whether the image displayed is an image which has been cyclically stored in the memory, or instead a recently-captured image data.